Conspiracy of Blood and Smoke

  34

  THEY RAN FOR SEVERAL BLOCKS UNTIL SHE SPOTTED an alley and dragged Schultz into it. He sagged against the stone wall, breathing hard, his gaze never leaving her face.

  “Who are you?” he gasped.

  “Never mind that.” Gretchen glanced over her shoulder at the mouth of the alley, but no one was walking past; they were alone. “You know something about the Reichstag fire. I need to know what it is. Now,” she added when he hesitated and she plunged her hand into her purse for her revolver.

  His throat constricted, but his voice was steady. “I nearly died to keep it safe from the Nazis. I’d hardly tell you.”

  “I want to use it to destroy them!” She gritted her teeth in frustration. How could she convince him that they were on the same side? “My friends and I went to your apartment. We saw what they did to your brother. We tracked you down to the Kuhle Wampe, but we were too late. They”—the words stuck in her throat—“they killed my best friend.” It was the strongest description she could think of for Daniel, far better than the weak-sounding “beau,” because he had been her dearest friend, the twin of her heart. “I know what kind of people they are. I shot them to free you.”

  For a moment, he stared at her. Up close, she saw that he had a black eye and a couple of his teeth were missing. He held himself tightly, as though he was in pain, and both knees of his trousers had holes in them.

  The distant wail of sirens cut through the air, but he and Gretchen didn’t move. Then he nodded, as if satisfied. “I hid Göring’s first report on the fire. I haven’t told anyone about it until now.”

  Gretchen shot him a suspicious look. “How the devil did you get Göring’s report?”

  “I was inspecting the Session Chamber to determine what accelerants had been used when Minister Göring came in with another man. They were arguing about the second man’s press communiqué on the fire.”

  “Tell me what they said,” Gretchen demanded. “Every word.”

  Schultz took a deep breath. “The man said he had based his report on the official findings of the police and fire brigades, but Göring said it was rubbish. He started writing on the paper, then threw it to the ground and shouted that he would dictate his own report to his secretary and have that distributed to the news agencies instead. As soon as they were gone, I read the report.”

  “What did it say?”

  “That there was only one arsonist—the Dutchman they captured on the scene.”

  Gretchen sucked in a breath. Her suspicions had been correct—the fire hadn’t been the result of a Communist or National Socialist conspiracy. No wonder Göring and his men were so desperate to silence Herr Schultz. If the report went public, everyone would find out that the National Socialists had known the arson attack had been the act of one deluded individual and the Enabling Act wouldn’t be passed tomorrow, keeping legislative powers out of Hitler’s hands.

  She raised her head to gaze at Herr Schultz. Why hadn’t the SA men killed him when he’d been in their custody? Once he was dead, their problems about the fire disappeared with him. Unless the report was still out there somewhere and they needed to get their hands on it. . . .

  She grabbed the front of Herr Schultz’s coat. “Where’s the report? Don’t bother lying to me,” she warned as he opened his mouth. “They only would have kept you alive if they needed you to tell them where it is.”

  “You’re right,” he said quietly. “I hid it behind the burnt wall panels in the Session Chamber. I didn’t dare take it out of the Reichstag, in case my fire chief ordered us searched to make sure we hadn’t stolen anything. I had the foolish notion that I could retrieve it later and sell it to a news agency. When I returned home from my next night shift and”—he broke off, tears shining in his eyes—“and found my brother murdered, I realized the Nazis had figured out what I’d done. His death was either a mistake or a warning. So I went to the tent camp and prayed they wouldn’t find me.” He wiped at his eyes with dirt-stained fingers. “And, of course, they did.”

  Gretchen’s hands fell from his coat. Her pulse pounded in her head, such a rapid rhythm that she felt incredibly light, as though she were no longer tethered to this world and might float away. Because she knew exactly what she had to do—and how to destroy the National Socialist Party. She would break into the ruined Reichstag, retrieve the paper, and deliver it to Herr Delmer. He would have the truth about the Reichstag fire published in his newspaper, and soon everyone would know that the National Socialists had known all along that the arson had been committed by one person. The only conspiracy had been the Party’s attempt to convince the public that they were in imminent danger from more Communist attacks and whip them into such a panic that they wouldn’t object to the Enabling Act’s passage. They had deliberately misled the public, just as Papa and Hitler had discussed all those years ago at his birthday celebration.

  “Thank you,” she said to Herr Schultz. She gave him a couple of bills from her dwindling supply of the Whitestones’ money. “You won’t be able to get over the border without papers, but maybe you can start a new life in another city.”

  He stared at the money. “Why are you giving me this?”

  She didn’t answer. But she knew she wouldn’t get out of Berlin alive, and money would be worthless to her. Once the report was made public, Herr Hanfstaengl would probably guess she had done it and tell the others about her. As soon as Hitler knew she was in Berlin, he would have every train, bus, and car leaving the city searched. She’d never be able to escape. After they had captured her, they would bring her to him. He would want to see her one last time before they killed her. Part of her didn’t care. Daniel’s death had drained all the color from the world. She didn’t want to lead a gray life, drifting through the years. And she needed his death to matter. He couldn’t have died in vain. She wouldn’t let that happen.

  Another part of her, though, was so terrified that she could barely breathe. I can handle this, she told herself. She could face Hitler again, knowing that she had avenged Daniel. He was worth any price.

  “You’d better get going,” she finally said, evading Herr Schultz’s question.

  “Thank you. A thousand thank-yous, Fräulein.” He kissed her hands.

  She watched him leave the alley with dry, aching eyes. Then she slipped out into the street and walked fast, keeping her head down, trying to look like an ordinary girl, hurrying because she was late for school or running errands for her mother, while in the distance police sirens continued to shriek.

  Back at the lodging house, Gretchen sat by the window, watching clouds scud across the sky and thinking about ways to break into the Reichstag. When images of the SA men, writhing in agony on the ground, flashed through her mind, she took deep breaths and blanked her thoughts, keeping the memories at bay. She wasn’t sorry, and she would do it again. But she couldn’t help wondering if she was turning into her father. Lashing out and hurting others because she was hurting.

  The difference between your father and us is we won’t ever lie to ourselves, Daniel had said.

  Tears surged into her eyes. No, she wouldn’t lie to herself. She had shot those men, and she was glad. If they suffered one-tenth of the pain Daniel must have felt, then it was worth it.

  Her thoughts turned back to the Reichstag. Although the building was no longer being used, she imagined that watchmen patrolled it. The best way to get inside was probably through the tunnel that ran from Göring’s palace to the Reichstag cellars. Its doorway was next to the porter’s lodge, she remembered Daniel saying.

  How could she sneak onto Göring’s grounds and into the tunnel without being seen? The minister and Hanfstaengl might be home, or the half-dozen servants that surely worked there. Frowning, she paced the small room. She’d crossed it several times before the answer hit her and she almost smiled. Of course! Tomorrow afternoon the Reichstag was scheduled to convene at its temporary location in the Kroll Opera House. Göring, as Reichstag Speaker, would attend and no d
oubt Hanfstaengl would be at his foreign press office, eagerly awaiting word on the Enabling Act’s passage so he could forward the news on to foreign correspondents. The servants would be busy cleaning, or readying the palace for a dinner party to celebrate the Enabling Act. There would be no better time for her to creep in, undetected.

  That night, she got into bed again with Daniel’s shirt in her arms. No matter how many times she buried her nose in his garment, she caught only a whiff of his scent. So much of him was gone, in just two days. Soon she would have nothing left of him but memories.

  She felt as though she had a glass ball in her chest, shimmering and fragile, and if she breathed too deeply, she would shatter it. Lying on her side, she took small sips of air, clutching Daniel’s shirt tightly.

  Every time she closed her eyes, his image pressed against her lids. Grinning at her in good-natured impatience as they sat in a crowded tearoom, his least favorite place in Oxford because of the fussy lace doilies and what he saw as the tedium of lingering over scones and tea when he would have far preferred to be doing something, anything. His gaze steady on hers as she talked about Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain, listening without interrupting while they walked in the fields behind the clinic, and whenever she stumbled over her words, unaccustomed to respectful silence from a male, he had encouraged her with a smile. And Daniel as she had seen him last: white-faced, his jaw set, stepping carefully across the sandy lakeshore. She could still feel his hand on her back, shoving her forward, and hear his voice shouting at her to run.

  Tears streamed from her eyes. She couldn’t help remembering what he said to her once, when they’d been escaping from Munich all those months ago: Gretchen, don’t you realize by now I would give up everything to be with you?

  He had, she thought as she swiped at her eyes. He had given everything, his very life, for her sake.

  Now it was her turn.

  She spent the morning in her bedroom, emerging only for breakfast and luncheon at a cheap café and to buy a flashlight at a hardware shop the next block over. The Reichstag was probably kept unlit, since it wasn’t being used, and she couldn’t waste time fumbling in the dark.

  When nearby church bells chimed two, she checked her appearance in the tarnished mirror: She looked ordinary in her black skirt, white blouse, and maroon cardigan—Daniel’s favorite. She slipped on her gray wool coat and exited the room, leaving her and Daniel’s suitcases at the foot of the bed. Whatever happened to her next, she doubted she’d need them. She carried her purse, though, her fully loaded revolver and the lock pick Daniel had bought to break into Frau Fleischer’s office concealed inside.

  Everything seemed like a dream: Berliners strolling the streets, chattering cheerfully to one another; automobiles gliding past; streetcars rumbling along. Gretchen felt as though an invisible bubble separated her from everyone, muffling the sounds of their voices and the blare of car horns.

  By the time she reached Göring’s palace, the sky had turned to white behind a wall of clouds and the air carried the sharp bite of an approaching snowfall. A long, wide driveway ran past the building, stretching back to the garages and courtyard. There was no sign of anyone. It had to be now. Gretchen raced down the driveway.

  On the right, she saw a small outbuilding—the lodge for the porter, she guessed. Praying he was out on his rounds, she darted to a wooden door at the side of his lodge. It was locked, but an instant’s work with her pick solved that problem. She slipped inside, glimpsing a set of steps leading down before the door shut behind her, enclosing her in a pocket of black.

  She switched on the flashlight. Its tiny circle of illumination guided her down the steps. At the bottom, she found herself in a long, brick-lined passage. Shining electric lights had been installed along the walls at periodic intervals. Clicking off the flashlight, she started forward.

  Something hard and flat shifted under her feet, then fell back into place with a loud clank.

  She froze. The floor was lined with loose steel plates. Every step she took would sound deafening.

  Keep going, she told herself. The noise might not carry up the stairs and through the closed door.

  She continued walking, the plates thunking underfoot. Each groan of metal clenched her heart. The tunnel seemed to run in a straight line; but underground, without the landmarks of buildings or the sky, it was impossible to tell which direction she traveled or how far she had gone. After a few minutes, she caught sight of a closed door ahead. As she got closer, she realized it was a massive door made of iron.

  It was locked, so she fitted the pick into the keyhole, wiggling back and forth until she heard the tumblers click. She pushed the door open, a wave of musty air washing over her.

  She walked a short distance before she found another iron door. Again she picked the lock and kept going. Every few minutes, she encountered another locked iron door and wanted to scream with impatience. This was taking too long. She looked at her wristwatch. Almost four o’clock. Had the Reichstag session ended? Was Göring arriving home right now?

  She raced through another doorway and found that the passage branched into two. This place was a maze! Stifling a cry of frustration, she chose a direction at random and hurried on, the steel plates clunking with every step she took. She found another iron door and picked its lock, then pushed through again, into a place of darkness and silence. The door clicked shut, cutting off the sharp gleam of light from the tunnel. For an instant, she stood still, listening with all of her might. Nothing. Only unbroken blackness.

  She let out a breath of relief. This must be it. She had made it to the Reichstag cellar.

  35

  GRETCHEN TURNED ON THE FLASHLIGHT. BY ITS weak beam, she could see that she was in a narrow passageway. She hesitated, thinking. The moment had come. All she had to do was go up the stairs, find the press report in the Session Chamber, and track down Delmer to give it to him. The morning edition of his English paper would blast the news that the National Socialists had known all along that the fire hadn’t been a Communist conspiracy and had deliberately whipped up the public’s fear so they could pass the Enabling Act—and put dictatorial powers in Hitler’s grasp. Hitler would be ruined, the Party disgraced. She didn’t see how they could overcome the scandal.

  As for her, she could flee from Berlin as soon as she gave Delmer the report. There might be enough time for her to sneak over the border using her false papers. But she couldn’t bring herself to care what happened to her. Nothing mattered except exposing the truth and finishing the work that Daniel had started.

  Thinking of him made her hands shake, causing the yellow beam from the flashlight to bounce around the passageway. She couldn’t let herself fall apart now. Resolutely, she wiped her mind blank and began walking, turning, then turning again as the passage seemed to double back on itself. For a sickening instant, she thought of mice in a maze.

  But she kept walking until the passage split into two. At the T-shaped intersection, she hesitated, sniffing the air. To the left, it smelled fresher, which meant a door was probably nearby. She set off in that direction.

  For several minutes, she walked the passage, hearing nothing but the shuffling of her footsteps. When she rounded a corner, she saw the dark shape of stairs winding up to the first floor. Relief arrowed through her. She wasn’t trapped down here. She rushed up the steps. They seemed to go on forever, and the muscles in her legs burned.

  The door at the top of the stairs was shut. She turned off the flashlight, fearing a watchman might be on duty. Then she eased the door open and stepped through.

  Here the blackness was so heavy she had to move by feel. As she inched forward, she trailed her hand along the wall. It felt like plaster and had buckled and scorched from the flames’ heat. The air stank of smoke and mildew. Beneath her feet, the carpet felt spongy, as though it had absorbed water from the firemen’s hoses and hadn’t dried out properly.

  For a moment, she stood still, listening, but all she heard was the re
lentless silence. The place seemed empty. She switched on the flashlight, sweeping its beam around the room she had stepped into.

  It was a massive lobby. If any cleanup had been attempted after the fire, she could see no evidence of it: the wood-paneled walls were blackened, and curtains hung in soot-stained shreds. An unlit chandelier hung so precariously from a half-melted chain that she feared it would crash down at any moment. Arrows written in chalk had been scrawled over the walls. The arson investigators’ markings, she guessed, for they must have traced the direction the arsonist and the fires had traveled.

  Frowning, she tried to remember the little she knew of the building’s layout, from the articles she’d read about the fire. The Session Chamber was to the left of the lobby.

  As she entered the room, she froze in shock. She had assumed the newspaper accounts had exaggerated the damage the blaze had caused—after all, in England she’d read that the Reichstag had burned to the ground, yet the building seemed mainly intact—but this room was a ruin.

  The cavernous, high-ceilinged chamber was a tangle of burnt wood. Tables and chairs had been shrunk to spindly skeletal remains, and the walls were warped and blistered from heat and water. The ceiling was gone. Overhead, the sky had turned the pale gray of pewter. She remembered that the Session Chamber’s famous glass dome had saved the building from further destruction: the glass had cracked, then shattered apart, shooting roiling masses of smoke into a sky flickering red from flames. The sudden enormous hole in the ceiling had acted as a natural chimney, sucking fire and smoke upward into the night.

  Hopelessness swept over Gretchen as she surveyed the mess. How could she find the report in this wreck of a room? The task was impossible.